Guidance on the Scottish Schools (Parental Involvement) Act 2006

Annex B

Strategy for parental involvement checklist

The checklist presented here takes account of the requirements in the Scottish Schools (Parental Involvement) Act 2006. It is also included in a tick box format in the Parents as Partners in their Children's Learning Toolkit.

Effective parental involvement is the joint responsibility of professionals and parents. The questions are designed to help education authorities develop an appropriate strategy for parental involvement in their area and to support parents' involvement in the development and review of that strategy. The checklist is consistent with HMIE's guide on partnership with parents, but does not replace that guidance which is available at www.hmie.gov.uk.

The Act requires that the strategy cover the education authority's duties to:

promote the involvement of parents in the education provided by the school to their child and to pupils generally at their child's school

promote the establishment of Parent Councils

give advice and information to Parent Councils and support their operation

give advice and information to parents generally, and

establish a complaints procedure for representations under the Act.

Themes

Act

Guidance

Developing a strategy

What arrangements do you have in place to develop. or review, a strategy for parental involvement?

How do you involve parents in the process of developing or reviewing your strategy?

How do you consult pupils about the Strategy?

What other parties do you include in developing or reviewing your strategy?

S2 of the Act requires strategy for parental involvement

See Section C, paras 1-5 of guidance

See Section 6 of the toolkit, Preparing the education authority strategy

Promoting parental involvement

Does your strategy cover the three levels of engagement with parents:

- Learning at home

- Home/School Partnership

- Parental representation

Does your strategy address the range of factors which may discourage parental involvement?

Does it outline how your authority and schools work with parents who find it difficult to support their children's education due to family circumstances?

Does it take account of the needs of Looked after children?

How does the strategy promote equal opportunities and take account of the needs of particular minority groups in your local area?

Does your strategy make links with the authority's duties under other relevant legislation, e.g. Additional Support for Learning Act?

Does your strategy make appropriate links with other relevant policy areas, e.g. curriculum, support to pupils, pre-school, additional support needs, customer care, and other agencies and businesses?

How does your strategy take account of the training and development needs of school staff and others working with children and their families?

S1 of the Act covers duty to promote parental involvement

S2 requires strategies to include reference to equal opportunities and looked after children

What does your authority do to make parents aware of their membership of the Parent Forum and what this means?

How does your authority promote and support Parent Councils in your area?

Do parents representatives have a general knowledge of the education authority duties to promote parental involvement?

Are parent representatives able to identify what they need to carry out their functions and access appropriate resources?

What does your authority do to assist parent representatives to ascertain the views of the wider Parent Forum?

What training and information does your authority offer for parent representatives, in particular, those involved in the appointments process for senior staff?

S5 and S6 of Act covers Parent Forum and Parent Councils

See Section C, paras 40-52 of guidance

See Section 7 of the toolkit

Advice, information and handling complaints

Does the strategy set out the arrangements your authority and schools have in place for giving advice and information to parents?

How do these arrangements apply in the case of parents who do not live with their children?

What arrangements do your authority and schools have in place for dealing with concerns/complaints from parents, or someone acting on their behalf?

How does your authority involve parents and others in the establishment and review of its complaints procedure?

How are parents in general made aware of your authority's complaints procedure?

S15 of Act covers complaints procedure

See Section C, paras 28-32 of guidance

Communicating the strategy

Do local authority staff have a general knowledge of the parental involvement legislation and the authority's duties to promote this?

Do appropriate local authority, school staff and support staff have sound knowledge of the provisions of the Scottish Schools (Parental Involvement) Act 2006 and Scottish Executive guidance and toolkit supporting the Act?

Is the strategy document included in your authority's Statement of Improvement Objectives?

Do all school development plans include parental involvement?

How are parents made aware of the strategy and how do they access it?

How are parents in the pre-school sector made aware of the benefits of parental involvement in children's education?

S3 and S4 of Act requires strategy to inform education authority's improvement plans and school development plans

Section C of guidance

Monitoring and reviewing strategy

How does your strategy link to HMIE's self-evaluation guidance on partnership with parents?

Does the strategy include arrangements to monitor and evaluate the impact of your authority's policies on parental involvement?

What do you do to consider and respond to parents' expectations and views on how they are involved in school education?

S2(3) of Act requires an education authority to review its strategy from time to time

Issues in Section C relevant to review as well as development of strategy